An old video of the Sony E3 2006 conference has made its way online

Noclip Game History Archive uploaded a video of the notorious conference as a part of its preservation efforts. The conference has been available through other channels, but is a little on the fuzzy side, as noted by Giant Bomb’s inferior version of the video that was uploaded in 2016.

While Sony has had some celebrated E3 conferences, like the 2016 one that featured God of War’s reveal and the 2015 show with Final Fantasy 7 Remake, The Last Guardian, Shenmue 3, and Horizon Zero Dawn, this 2006 conference was remembered for its deluge of awkward moments, which seemingly foreshadowed the struggles Sony would go on to have during the PS3 era. It was the source of former Sony CEO Kaz Hirai’s “Riiiiiiiidge Racer!,” the giant enemy crabs meme, and the announcement of the PS3’s shocking $599 price tag, which, when adjusted for inflation, is the equivalent of the PS5 costing around $900 now.

There are also a few trailers of first-party games that were canceled, like The Getaway 3 and Eight Days, giving the show more historical importance that goes beyond memes. Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, Insomniac Games’ launch title Resistance: Fall of Man, the widely panned dragon game Lair, and the Sixaxis-heavy Warhawk, on the other hand, are among some of the games featured in the show that did eventually get released.

This is just one of many older videos Noclip Game History Archive has put online. This channel is a spin-off of Noclip, an outlet famous for its lengthy video game documentaries on games like Horizon Zero Dawn, The Last of Us Part I, the Demon’s Souls remake, and the fan-made Bloodborne PS1-esque demake, just to name a few.

Noclip came into owning boxes of tapes from GameSpot and has made it its mission to put many of them online, a process founder Danny O’Dwyer (who also used to work at GameSpot) detailed in a recent video. These tapes have contained other higher resolution videos from the past, like the reveal trailer for the first Uncharted, the first trailer for Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction, and the 2006 teaser for Metal Gear Solid 4.

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What did The ESA say about E3 2024 and E3 2025?

This week, notes from a meeting packet of the Los Angeles City Tourism Board found their way online. A summary of planned city conventions was found. Within were mentions of “E3 cancellations for 2024 and 2025”.

According to The Entertainment Software Association — the owner of E3 — (via VGC), the group is in discussions on the future of E3.

“ESA is currently having conversations about E3 2024 (and beyond), and no final decisions about the event have been made at this time,” reads the statement.

The future of E3 has been up in the air for the last few years. After not taking place in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, E3 2021 was an online-only event. Following that, E3 2022 was canceled due to ongoing COVID-19 concerns.

E3 2023 was set to take place from June 13-16, 2023, but cancelled due to what organizer ReedPop called a lack of “sustained interest.”

“It simply did not garner the sustained interest necessary to execute it in a way that would showcase the size, strength, and impact of our industry,” claimed the organization.

With E3’s future uncertain, a wealth of other events have sprung up in the meantime. Geoff Keighley’s rival event, Summer Game Fest, took place on June 8, 2023. Ubisoft, Microsoft, and Sony – among others – held their own shows either in May or June of this year.

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Keighley said he “saw the wheels falling off the wagon of E3”

Keighley spoke about this battle of the summer shows at length on the VGC Podcast. He was asked what he felt about being the “E3 killer,” but instead of dancing on event’s grave, he said it was more of a self-inflicted wound.

“I think E3 sort of killed itself in a way,” said Keighley. “I understand why people say [Summer Game Fest killed E3], but I think if anything, we created Summer Game Fest, and I built Summer Game Fest because I saw the wheels falling off the wagon of E3.”

Keighley famously pulled out of the 2020 show (which was said to be full of influencers and celebrities) before it folded that year because he “didn’t feel comfortable.” During the podcast, he recalled going to E3 when he was 15 in 1995 and said it was a great show that “defined his summer” every year. Before stating that its 2023 plans were a bit ambitious and that the market would have decided if both shows stayed, he reiterated that E3 had its own issues.

“It was so exciting to me, and it was heartbreaking to see that start to fall apart,” he continued. “I think they had a relevancy problem, and then they also had a participation problem over the final years.”

Keighley pushed back on the idea that his show accelerated E3’s death, as some assumed that Summer Game Fest was another outlet publishers could go to and that meant E3 would atrophy. He also said that he just didn’t see E3 and Summer Game Fest fighting for exclusives and called out that this year’s lineup didn’t change once E3 officially folded.

“I get the sentiment around it,” said Keighley. “It was sad to me that we had to decide to go off and build something new, but we did that all in partnership with the publishers, and our list of partners for Summer Game Fest did not change at all with the cancelation of E3 this year. Everyone we’ve been working with, we’ve been working with for months around Summer Game Fest. So there was a world where Summer Game Fest and E3 would have coexisted, and we had talked a lot to [E3 organizer] ReedPop about that possibility, because they were focused much more on a big trade event, and consumer event, and that’s not what we were doing with Summer Game Fest.”

In addition to the livestream on June 8 at noon PT, Summer Game Fest is also holding Play Days for the press, something that’s private and a lot smaller than what E3 was aiming to do. He also called out how expensive it was for some publishers to go to E3, something that’s not as much of a problem for Summer Game Fest.

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E3 will continue in the future

Despite the cancelation of this year’s event, Reedpop has assured players, developers and publishers that they will continue to work with the ESA to create “future E3 events”. Reedpop told IGN the reasons for E3 2023 being canceled:

This was a difficult decision because of all the effort we and our partners put toward making this event happen, but we had to do what’s right for the industry and what’s right for E3. We appreciate and understand that interested companies wouldn’t have playable demos ready and that resourcing challenges made being at E3 this summer an obstacle they couldn’t overcome. For those who did commit to E3 2023, we’re sorry we can’t put on the showcase you deserve and that you’ve come to expect from ReedPop’s event experiences.

Kyle Marsden-Kish, Global VP of Gaming, ReedPop

The ESA had allegedly sent an email to its members earlier today stating the event “simply did not garner the sustained interest necessary to execute it in a way that would showcase the size, strength, and impact of our industry.” After companies like Nintendo, Sony, Microsoft, Ubisoft, Sega, and Tencent confirmed they would not be attending E3 2023, it became clear that this year’s event was incredibly unlikely to go ahead.

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Who is not attending E3 2023?

Sega has “decided not to participate in E3 2023 as an exhibitor”, the company told IGN in a statement. Tencent also confirmed they would not be attending the show. Despite initially stating their intentions to be there, Ubisoft canceled their E3 appearance yesterday. Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft will not be at the show either.

IGN has been told that others plan to skip E3 2023 but have not confirmed their intentions at the time of writing. Bearing in mind that E3 events from previous years already had a solid lineup at this time of the year, the reluctance of any publisher to commit to the show is certainly worrying.

E3’s new management Reedpop had attempted to work with developers and publishers to provide exactly what they wanted out of the show, but this doesn’t seem to have worked. There is a fair amount of silence coming from the event organizer right now, which is leading many to speculate the event may be canceled again as time is fast running out.

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What games will Ubisoft bring to E3 2023?

Ubisoft tries to keep their show lineup as much of a secret as possible, although previous years have shown that the company does have a very leaky ship. E3 rumors are yet to get going so new announcements are currently unknown, but there are plenty of other games Ubisoft could bring to the show. Guillemot said “if E3 happens, we will be there and we will have a lot of things to show,” and these things could include:

• The Crew Motorfest
• Assassin’s Creed Mirage
• Skull and Bones
• Trackmania
• Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora
• XDefiant
• Tom Clancy’s The Division Heartland
• Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time Remake
• Beyond Good and Evil 2

Ubisoft has been supporting E3 for many years without missing a show. On the other hand, other major companies like Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo are all rumored to be skipping this year’s show. E3 2023 will be held between June 13-16 and will return to being an in-person event for the first time since the Covid outbreak.

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E3 2023 won’t be the first time Sony Interactive Entertainment skips the show

PlayStation hasn’t had a presence at E3 for a number of years now, but Microsoft and Nintendo have traditionally maintained a booth at the annual event. Microsoft previously announced that it’ll host its own Xbox event this summer, and IGN‘s sources have confirmed that the company won’t be at the E3 show floor.

Nintendo, who’s always attended E3 despite its Direct showcases, hasn’t responded to IGN’s request for comment and neither have Sony and Microsoft. However, E3 organizer ReedPop has released a statement insisting that E3 is a “significant” industry event, and this year, it has received “tremendous amount of interest” from a number of “big companies.”

It’s not known who the attendees are at this time but we’ll keep an eye out.

E3 will return to the Los Angeles Convention Center in June. E3 2023 will take place between June 11th and 16th, with the first two days dedicated to digital showcases from partners.

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E3 2024 and 2025 expected to have more than 60,000 attendees

On page 32 of the document, both E3 2024 and 2025 will take place in early June (via GameRevolution). For both events, it is expected that there will be approximately 68,400 attendees and the ESA has requested 27,940 room nights.

Further on in the document, as a point of curiosity on how much it costs to plan E3 in the first place, it is revealed that E3 2024 is expected to gross about a million dollars, though it has a discount of another million, leaving just a thousand dollars for net rent. That said, the entire electrical bill will apparently cost about $1.3 million, which is an incredible amount.

As reported earlier, E3 2023 will be split between Business Days (June 13-15) that is focused on developers and industry professionals, while Gamer Days (June 15-16) will be open to general public. They will take place in separate halls for expedience.

The post E3 2024 and 2025 Booked For LA Convention Center appeared first on PlayStation LifeStyle.

E3 2023 dates confirmed

E3 2023 will take place through June 13-16.

June 13-15 will be “Business Days” and focused on industry pros, while June 15-16 will be “Gamer Days” and be open to the general public.

Business Days will welcome developers, publishers, distributors, and the gaming media to conduct their work. Pros will no doubt be happy to hear this, as dodging the public can add additional strain to an already stressful working environment.

Gamer Days will be enhanced by “spectacular booths” and a “dedicated theater offering deep-dive looks at highly anticipated titles.”

While the four days of E3 will officially begin on June 13, partnered digital events and showcases will precede the show starting on June 11.

It had already been announced that ReedPop, best known as the company behind PAX and Comic Con, would be taking over. Back in July, it announced that next year’s E3 would be “a week of titanic AAA reveals” and “earth-shaking world premieres.” Here’s hoping it lives up to the hype!

The post E3 2023 Dates Confirmed, Event Returns Under New Management appeared first on PlayStation LifeStyle.

How ReedPop will revive E3 2013

Unlike the past several E3 showcases which were either cancelled or only had a digital version of the event, ReedPop plans E3 2013 to keep the digital showcase along with in-person consumer components, according to a press release. Lance Fensterman, President of ReedPop, is excited to be able to give E3 a much-needed comeback:

It’s a tremendous honor and privilege for ReedPop to take on the responsibility of bringing E3 back in 2023. With the support and endorsement of the ESA, we’re going to build a world-class event to serve the global gaming industry in new and broader ways than we already do at ReedPop through our portfolio of world-leading events and web sites.

Kyle Marsden-Kish, ReedPop Global VP of Gaming, will lead the team responsible for the E3 2023 and promises that it will be “recognizably epic” and “a return to form that honors what’s always worked.” ESA President Stanley Pierre-Louis is looking forward to having ReedPop’s assistance with its “world-class talent and a keen understanding of the video game industry.”

While it’s unclear if E3 2023 will be open to the public, media registration for the event will start in late 2022. ReedPop will provide more information on the event’s schedules, exhibitors, and travel guides at a later date.

These past few years, numerous publishers and developers have established relationships with Geoff Keighley’s Summer Game Fest, which is also planning a larger in-person event in 2023, while E3 has been absent or diminished due to the pandemic and other reasons. So it will require quite an effort from ReedPop and ESA to revitalize the former premier video gaming event in the year, but it appears that E3 2023’s return is more credible than before.

In other news, Rockstar Games admits that Red Dead Online will be affected by GTA 6 development, and the November God of War release date is best for team to avoid crunch.

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